With the Great Resignation still in full swing, finding the right candidates to fill roles has become a much more difficult task than ever before.
Traditionally, most job ads would be inundated with eager and interested candidates looking to climb the career ladder. Now, it’s a candidate-driven market, which means they have the power and endless options at their disposal.
So, the question lingers: How does a company write a compelling job ad that will stand out amongst the crowd?
1) Ensure it is clear & includes the right details
As a job ad is often what gives candidates the first impression of your company, it’s crucial that it includes all the correct information from the get-go to avoid any future confusion.
Here are some of the core elements your job ad should include:
A simple succinct job title
Details about the company and team
Details about the available role
Details about the offer
Job duties and performance-oriented goals (limited to six – seven max)
Job requirements and skills
Salary range
Location specifics
Application process overview
The expected start date
Without the above, a candidate could potentially see your company as unprofessional and even a bit suspicious that you have something to hide.
Note: Try to be as realistic as possible when listing job duties, requirements and skills. A candidate will be deterred if your job ad asks for candidates with entry-level experience to apply but expect them to complete senior level tasks.
2) Exclude all jargon, buzzwords & cliches
According to a survey conducted by SEEK, 60 per cent of candidates say terms like ‘ninja’, ‘guru’, and ‘superstar’ are gimmicky.
As fun and creative as they sound, let’s be realistic: no candidate is going to type “Social Media Guru” into Google or a job board. It’s also likely they won’t respond well to every second sentence being smothered with office jargon, buzzwords or slang like “synergy” or “low hanging fruit”.
Instead, opt for a more straightforward approach with your job ad copy by omitting these (as well as overused cliches and useless adjectives), as they only take up space and complicate the main messages you want to communicate.
3) Show off your brand’s voice
Do you have a truly unique brand voice that your team has worked hard on building and nurturing? If the answer is yes, then it’s a wasted chance not to show it off.
A brand voice can reflect a brand’s personality, so naturally, this impacts how your entire brand is identified. It serves the purpose of demonstrating the core values and goals that your brand, founders and executive team are striving toward transparently.
For candidates, a brand voice can guide them toward understanding your brand’s distinctive qualities and culture, ultimately enticing them to want to explore employment opportunities with your company.
4) Showcase your company’s benefits and perks
Whether your workplace offers employees flexibility, days off on their birthday, impressive paternity leave policies, pet-friendly offices in sought after locations, overseas travel or even growth and training initiatives, it’s a good idea to flaunt these in your job ad.
Although candidates don’t necessarily need perks to enjoy their jobs, providing these nice-to-haves can help your company demonstrate it will care about their well-being and it’s invested in their overall health and future.
Certain benefits can also help to sway candidates from picking a job with one of your competitors if their values and goals align with your company’s.
In addition to your company’s perks, you should take the time to highlight your team’s achievements, past work and future plans for work.
5) Eliminate any unconscious bias
The language you choose to use in your job ad is incredibly powerful and its impact depends on how you wield it.
For this reason, it’s important to be wary of the threat of unconscious bias in your copy and make a conscious decision to implement gender-neutral job ads to encourage people of all identities and pronouns to apply.
When writing gender-neutral job ads, stripping your descriptions of words viewed as either male or female-oriented is a great place to start.
Yet, at the same time, that’s only the beginning. There is so much more that companies can do to craft gender-neutral job ads such as directly stating that you foster an inclusive work environment, being mindful of pronouns and recognising masculine-coded words.
Overall, it can be difficult to find the perfect candidate for your company, especially as recruitment pools continue to dry up. However, if you are more thoughtful in how you write your job ad, there’s a higher chance that it will reach those looking for the next step in their career.
Michael Osmond has been with JobAdder for 2.5 years as the Head of People. Michael is passionate about creating workplace experiences that help people, teams and organisations thrive. He loves working closely with founders and leadership teams to design and execute progressive performance cultures that drive organisational success and an amazing employee experience. Michael has 11 years’ experience in People Teams having spent 6 years in Financial Services and then more recently 3 years with Football Federation Australia – the governing body for Football in Australia.Michael is a generalist but has a background of big change projects in the organisations he has worked in that align with the overall business strategy. These have been in the areas of people performance, mental health well-being, DE&I, employee engagement, organisational design/change, compensations & benefits and L&D.